With full captions explaining how bees live, function communally, communicate, feed, and reproduce, Bees is an insightful examination in outstanding color photographs of mankind's favorite insect.   Honeybees, bumblebees, mining bees, dwarf bees, carpenter, leafcutter, and mason bees: bees come in many different types, with more than 16,000 species worldwide. The bees we are most familiar with, bumblebees and honeybees, live in colonies and play a major role in pollinating the crops, plants, and flowers around us. And bees produce honey—reputedly the food of the gods—a function of bees' lifecycle, which humans have exploited for millennia. Many bees today are domesticated, and beekeepers collect honey, beeswax, pollen, and royal jelly from hives for human use. A typical bee produces a teaspoon of honey in her lifetime. Bees is an exciting collection of photographs showing these fascinating insects in their natural habitat. Flexibound Book; 4 15/16 x 6 5/8 inches; 224 pages.